


Feed the Birds

by OrionLady



Category: White Collar
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Families of Choice, Father-Son Relationship, Friendship, Gen, Grieving, Insecurity, Loss, Metaphors make the world go round, Parent-Child Relationship, Peter is a Dad™, Reconciliation, Thwarted Crimes, Trust Issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-15
Updated: 2019-12-12
Packaged: 2021-01-31 08:57:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 13,898
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21443602
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OrionLady/pseuds/OrionLady
Summary: Peter doesn’t understand loss like this, why he feels so empty, especially when he hasn’t even lost anything. Isn’t everything exactly the way it’s supposed to be? What they wanted, their individual happily ever afters?Or: Four times Neal got a present and one time Neal got a present. Set post-series.
Relationships: Elizabeth Burke/Peter Burke, Peter Burke & Neal Caffrey
Comments: 57
Kudos: 133





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I can’t believe I wrote this. I finished binging all six seasons in a fevered haze, like, ‘Dude. There’s no point writing something for this series. You can’t fix the ending.’ And my brain was all, ‘wanna bet, peasant?’ 
> 
> Then I listened to Emile Pandolfi's "Feed the Birds" and this was born.

‘What if I was the last sight you ever saw,  
Would you die with a smile on your face?  
Well don’t even try to say you will,  
Because you’d hardly recognize the sight.  
The young are getting old and the summer is cold,  
All the birds have been singing at night.’

“The Birds Are Singing At Night” ~ Lord Huron

Yeasty bread is very bad for birds of all shapes and sizes. So is anything they can’t chew or digest, like the fat cashews one little boy threw at the ducks in Central Park. The best thing for them are seeds, small pellets, or sunflower shells they can gobble down without risk of choking or intestinal ailments.

Many hours of research, both online and through real world observation, have led to these conclusions. Many, _many_ hours of research, usually done when other, more pressing matters should be attended to.

Sometimes though…sometimes it’s a better alternative than staring out office windows or sitting in a bathroom, alone, hardly blinking, and being shocked to see that an hour has passed by in what feels like two shallow breaths.

A warm hand, tipped by manicured fingernails, passes along Peter’s shoulder and rubs at the skin behind his ear.

“Did you come here to, what was it again? Ruminate?”

Peter doesn’t move for a long minute. Then he gives a jilted, uneven kind of nod. “Yeah, that’s…yeah.”

Elle hums in her throat, rounding the park bench so she can sit beside him. Crossing her legs, she takes some of the birdseed out of the paper bag in Peter’s lap and sprinkles it out over the walkway.

Birds of all sort come fluttering towards the offering, from doves to pigeons to your garden variety crow. Even a blue jay. Then again, maybe they’re just starting to get used to Peter’s presence every Friday morning and the promise of breakfast, feeding birds in the lesser known alcoves of the Park.

“Is your rumination working?” Elle claps off her hands. “It sure is relaxing, if you like birds.”

Peter’s face barely changes, but a linear divot deepens between his brows. He blinks quickly now. “I don’t like birds. I like pigeons.”

“Ah, I see.” Though Elle’s raised brows express that she very much does not see and does not really want to. “This is a new thing for you, since the anniversary passed. Should I be worried about your newfound love of pigeons? Considering a career change to ornithologist?”

That finally gets a smile out of Peter, a small one. “Not a chance. I like my current job too much.”

“That’s because you’re so good at it.”

Elle leans in for a kiss and Peter obliges, still smiling against her lips.

When they pull away, Peter watches one of the pigeons do their funny little run. The bird is on its way to a clump of seeds that got caught in a pavement crack. So determined. No competition for it, no predators nearby.

It uncoils something in Peter’s shoulders, though his face remains pensive. “Sometimes I just need time to…be still. I’m sorry I’ve been making a habit of it, Elle.”

“Don’t be sorry.” Elle takes his hand. “If this is what you need, then I wouldn’t dream of keeping you from it. We all need downtime. Yours just looks a little different than most peoples’ idea of relaxing. And speaking of relaxing!”

Elle thumbs through her phone until she finds a photo. “What do you think?”

“A rooster cake?” Peter lights up. “Where did you even find this?”

“I had a caterer friend bake one specially for us.” Elle winks.

“You’re a miracle worker.”

“You just happened to marry a woman who _also_ loves her job.”

Peter laughs again at the red and green cake, cut out perfectly in the shape of a crowing rooster. In the middle of it, on the rusty icing of its wings, is a giant yellow ‘1,’ and Peter is bowled over afresh by the fact his son has been on this earth for a whole revolution of it.

Neal Jr. is _obsessed _with farm animals and all things barn yard. Well, obsessed might be a stretch, since it’s impossible to know the full extent of a baby’s thoughts. But he refuses to play with anything except his farm animal toy set and all of his stuffies are pigs and cows.

They tried to hand him a spaceship once and he made a face, complete with unimpressed burble, and picked up his toy barn instead. Elle jokes that they’re well on their way to raising a farmer or a rancher.

“Promise me you won’t work late tonight,” says Elle, standing. “We’re having a little celebration for him. Diana might even come over with Theo, since she’s in town, and the boys can have a play date.”

Peter kisses her again. “I wouldn’t miss it for the world.”

Later that night, after a day of successful frauds uncovered and paperwork signed and filed and rubber band balls thrown angrily in the trash, Peter gets out of his car and mounts the steps of their home—

And a tiny blue box, dotted with sheep, sits in front of the door.

Peter stops.

Looks around, looks at the box.

The street is quiet for the evening, a windless summer night already starting to get dark. No neighbours are out in their yards or people walking away down the street, and other than a dog barking a few houses up, no sound.

Peter does the only logical thing left, which is to pick up the gift. It’s feather light, so light in fact that Peter wonders if it’s totally empty, if someone left a box of tissue paper as a prank or a statement on how asinine it is to give babies presents.

But there’s a computer-printed label attached to the big blue bow.

_‘For Neal._’

That’s it. Nothing more, nothing less. No fancy trims or decorations and even the string holding the tag down is old fashioned twine. The ribbon doesn’t look store bought, more like a thin, silky fabric cut off of a dress or scarf. There are even frayed edges on the non-bias side of the weave.

Then a scary thought takes root—what if it’s a bomb? A bio weapon created by some criminal to use against the evil FBI agent who busted him?

Peter unties the bow and lifts the lid slowly, checking for any wires or blinking lights. Mercifully, there are none. Instead, Peter finds himself staring down at _more_ fabric.

His breathing misses a beat.

There is something surreal about the sudden contrast: briefcase in one hand, cheery children’s box in the other. Father against son. Hardened man with a gun coming home to be tender man who makes silly faces at his baby.

Peter takes the tag off and puts it in his pocket. Stands there a moment longer, feeling lost.

“Oh, honey, there you are!” Elle greets him when he finally opens the door with a peck and an excited smile. The courtesy of her energy is Diana, already sitting on the couch while their sons romp around on the floor. “Come on in so we can eat this cake.”

“Glad you could make it!” Peter makes a beeline for his former agent, pulling her in for a hug. “And I see you’ve already given Junior his gift.”

Diana nods with a sheepish smile to where Peter points, the stuffed chestnut horse clamped in Neal’s pudgy hands. “He got into the wrapping paper when I set it down. Felt cruel to make him wait for it.”

After dinner, playing catch up on weeks of missed stories, and slices of that giant rooster—Neal shrieked with delight when he saw it, clapped hands and all—they end up in a circle around the play mat, watching Neal tear open presents with his doll sized finger nails and help from Mom and his new friend Theo. It’s entertaining to watch the older boy ‘assist.’

Peter gives the blue box last, mainly because it’s so close to bed time and Neal won’t have a lot of time use it. Allowing Peter time to digest the whole thing.

When Elle opens the box, she glances up at Peter in surprise. However, rather than saying all the things he can read in her eyes, she just takes the itty bitty black trilby out of its nest, complete with a midnight velvet band, and sets it on top of Neal’s head.

The sight of her hand lovingly pressing the expensive, custom baby hat over Neal’s auburn tresses is a freight train full of bricks screaming straight into Peter’s chest. He takes another bite of cake to cover it up. Everything tastes wrong.

“Oh, Peter,” says Diana, with a meaningful look. “It’s beautiful. Maybe we can turn Junior here into a hat connoisseur too.”

The tag burns where it hides in Peter’s pocket.

That night, half asleep, Elle rolls over and says in a tired slur, “Closure is an important part of the grieving process. I’m proud of you, sweetie…”

_She thinks I bought the hat_, Peter realizes. Of course, why wouldn’t she? _A sentimental gift from un-sentimental man._

Peter chooses to let her believe that. And he wants to as well, especially since the hat becomes one of Neal’s favourites and his son wobbling around, dapper little hat brim slipping over his eyes, brings a grin to the faces of people passing on the street.

But that first night, a little past the one year anniversary, he doesn’t sleep.

Fed up with the never ending tumble of thoughts, Peter silently gets out of bed and pads down the stairs, in nothing but a T-shirt and flannel pants, feet bare. He feels like a ghost, propelled by something without a name. Something no therapist can ever parse out in enough to detail to get rid of inside his aching throat, his shaking hands.

Can loss fairly be called loss if you haven’t lost anything?

The wind has certainly picked up now, whipping the maples surrounding their front stoop into a frothy, evergreen lather. Leaves blowing around against the backdrop of a starless night.

Peter slowly, ever so slowly, opens the front door.

He’s instantly cold but he doesn’t feel it, white toes carrying him across the threshold, from carpet to stone. He peeks out into the night.

There’s nothing there of course, no person standing in the shadowy recesses of the trees or his recycle bins. Peter stops blinking again, hair tousled and clothes ripped at by passing gusts of wind.

Nothing sits on the stoop but him. Peter feels like the only one alive, the only human in a planet full of mannequins, plastic people with their plastic smiles and plastic hopes and dreams.

It is then, for the inaugural time, that Peter begins to ponder whether _he’s_ the plastic one in a real world.

He stands there and quivers, eyes unseeing.

Somewhere out the dark, an owl calls a long, mournful note.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Peter secretly bristles. “Are you telling me, armchair psychologist style, to let myself ‘feel what I’m going to feel?’ Really?”
> 
> “No,” says Reese, a touch firm. “I’m telling you that self punishment will never work, no matter how alluring it is to men like us who value honour.”

‘I told him I saw this coming,  
That I’d practically packed up my things.  
I was glad at the time that I said I was fine  
But all honesty knows, I wasn’t ready, no…  
Oh let him go, bluebird.’

“Bluebird” ~ Sara Bareilles

One more year passes and it’s easy, this living thing. It’s the easiest thing in the world. There is nothing more effortless than keeping busy and kissing his wife and ticking off boxes, two hundred and forty five days of them, to be exact.

It’s Friday morning, and Peter is in a small corner store lineup. Most people are buying coffee or pastries or scratch cards on their way to work.

Peter is not most people.

The store isn’t far from an underground entrance and its bustling steps, about half a block away, but it’s before seven-thirty and therefore a little less crazy than it will be in an hour.

So Peter is more than a little surprised to feel a tap on his shoulder and, turning, to see someone other than his wife.

“Hughes, what are you doing here?” Peter stares at the man like he’s never seen him before. “Sorry, sir. I mean, how are you?”

Hughes smiles with no small amount of warmth, looking old and comfortable in his pullover and sneakers. “I’m not your boss anymore, Peter. Reese is fine—I’m not a ‘sir’ to anybody these days.”

“You’ll always be so to me.” And Peter means it, without a drop of irony.

Hughes waves him off, smile growing. “Enough of that. I came to see an old friend today, not Peter the agent. Though I must say, your closure rate is still one of the highest in the Bureau, Jones tells me.”

“Just doing my job,” says Peter. This one doesn’t go down so well, ash inside of Peter’s mouth, the slimy pockets behind his gums.

The pulsing in his throat gets stronger.

Reese, of course, can see straight through him, though he’s quiet for a moment. They shuffle forward with the line. Peter’s hand grows clammy around his purchase.

“They still haven’t convinced you to work for DC’s field office, I see.”

Peter shakes his head. “I’m right where I belong, running our taskforce here. It’s home.”

“Good for you,” says Hughes, catching Peter off guard. “I like it when a person knows what they want. Not swayed by every opinion that flits their way.”

“I half wondered if you were here as an ambassador to twist my arm,” Peter admits. “They do this every few years, offer me the same job under a different guise or with different perks. Last year they offered to buy us a house in Washington! Can you believe that?”

Hughes throws him an appraising look. “Do you really think I’d come out of retirement just to badger you about a job?”

“You’re a better man that that, Reese.”

“And don’t you forget it.”

Peter grins.

Reese mirrors it. He doesn’t seem interested in the crowds around him or the beautiful, sunny day, preferring to survey his younger friend with a gaze that reminds Peter of his father.

“It’s the two year anniversary,” he says, calm and clear.

“Yes.” Peter looks him right in the eye. “It is. And let me save you the trouble of asking by saying I’m fine, I’ve grieved. I’m well adjusted to his loss and all that jazz.”

Reese lifts one shrewd brow. “I’m not your superior or your wife, Peter. You don’t have to convince me.”

Peter sighs, just slightly too loud to be passed off. “I have a life, a family, an awarded career, everything I’ve ever wanted. What’s there to be sad about?”

Something inside of Reese’s eyes flares for a moment, a bolt of remembrance that takes him completely out of the time and space of this corner shop. Peter recognizes the look so fast because he sees it in the windows of his high rise office sometimes, the reflection of all the things he can’t say.

It’s Peter’s turn at the cash. He hands over a few bills and Reese shakes himself back to the present.

“Bird seed?” is all he asks.

“My Friday morning ritual.” Peter thanks the cashier and takes his paper bag full of seeds. “I’m guessing it’s how you knew where to find me this early. Elizabeth told you?”

Reese nods. “That, and I think someone at the Bureau confused your address for mine. This arrived on my doorstep last night. I’m assuming it’s for Junior? I know his birthday is in a few months.”

He pulls a parcel out of his coat pocket, long and thin and wrapped in humble brown paper, decorated with little cartoon animals and trees. Once again, a cardstock tag reads—‘_For Neal_.’ No return address or name of any kind.

Peter’s mouth goes dry. “Yeah, it is. Thanks. By any chance, was there something beside this on the doorstep?”

“As a matter of fact, yes—a bottle of my favourite German schnapps had a bow on it. If it was intended for your family, I can send it along too.”

“No, no.” Peter manages a plastic, frail smile. “It’s definitely for you. The gift found exactly who it was supposed to.”

Reese huffs a laugh. “Two years old. Is he a terror yet?”

“Surprisingly, no. Not yet, anyway. Junior has Elle’s personality, thank God. He’s only fiery when it counts, otherwise content to go with the flow.”

“I’d love to meet him sometime.”

Peter shakes his hand. “You’re welcome for supper whenever you want.”

They exit the store, breathing in crisp air around Manhattan’s smoke. Hughes looks out over the sea of people, the cabs and their blaring horns, the forest of tall buildings, this city he helped defend for over forty years.

“Peter,” he says, eyes earnest now. “Sometimes what we want isn’t what we need. Sometimes they aren’t the same thing. You follow me?”

Peter doesn’t, or maybe he does more than he wants to, but either way he nods. It’s obedient, rote habit out of being asked a question by that trusted voice.

It’s Reese’s turn to sigh, a little tired sounding. “Peter, I don’t know all the details of what happened that day, how he died. But don’t play pretend. That was Caffrey’s flaw, never truly baring himself to the world…except maybe to you. If it’s messy, if it’s infuriating, if it’s embarrassing, I don’t care—but make peace with those memories.”

Peter secretly bristles. “Are you telling me, armchair psychologist style, to let myself ‘feel what I’m going to feel?’ Really?”

“No,” says Reese, a touch firm. “I’m telling you that self punishment will never work, no matter how alluring it is to men like us who value honour.”

Peter tucks his wallet away for an excuse not to look at Hughes.

“There’s no heroism in immolation,” Reese whispers and Peter nearly loses it then. Sensation drains from the knees down.

After a few heartbeats it passes, but the internal shaking remains, that mouldy sandwich feeling inside of Peter’s lungs. He’s decaying from the inside out, he realizes with a fascinated brand of awe. Sticky spores are growing inside of his cells, the arteries and the cartilage that grinds far enough down to be aching.

They say a hasty but heartfelt goodbye.

When Peter presents the gift to Neal after supper that night, those beautiful, hand drawn animals making his son gasp in wonder, what lies underneath them is—this time—exactly what he expects.

Peter knew what it was before Hughes even placed it in his hand.

“Paint!” Junior squeals. “C’n we, Daddy?”

So of course Peter digs out some recycled printer paper and clears an area on the kitchen table. Neal is a lanky but small toddler, so he barely reaches the surface, even on his knees. Peter retrieves a couch cushion and it helps raise him higher.

“You too, Daddy.”

“Okay, okay.” Peter picks up a marker, not using it right away. The paints are a long row of high brand, glossy water colours. They even come with a lithe brush, but Neal seems to enjoy using his fingers more. “What are you drawing, love?”

Neal dips his fingers in the water, then in the pad of purple. “A…a goose.”

“Oh yeah.” Peter chuckles. “Like that Canadian one we saw chasing away a squirrel in our back yard.”

“Yeah!”

“He was a meanie, wasn’t he?”

“Meaniest,” Neal agrees with a nod.

He loops his index around to make the bird’s neck and belly, leaving a little triangle at the top for the beak. Peter looks down at his own page. Blank on this side. Sprayed a bit by Neal’s reckless artistic expression.

Peter stares at the speckles for a long time. They’re little dots or spheres, like bird seed. Like blood. Like rain on a night that should never have happened. Like spilled wine that stains in place of tears.

“Daddy?”

“Yeah, buddy. I’m here.” Peter sits up straighter with a sudden inhale, rummaging around for a smile and finding one deep in the pocket inside his heart with his son’s name on it. “I haven’t painted for a long time.”

Neal has heard lots of stories, is a glib child with little fear. So he gazes straight up at his father and asks, “Bubba Neal?”

Peter and Elizabeth considered calling Junior’s namesake “Uncle Neal” in all the stories they tell and exaggerate about the man. But Peter, physically, cannot do it. It’s not right, a picture out of focus.

‘Uncle’ isn’t even _remotely_ right.

So they refer to him as “Bubba,” both because it’s neutral, easier to say, and because, well…it sounds an awful lot like another word that never came to be. One that Peter longs for like he longed for this little boy sitting before him.

It hits him all over again, looking at these brown eyes instead of blue. How much he never noticed he was planning on, a big bucket list of a hoped for future, until it got scorched out.

“Bubba Neal,” says Peter, hoarse. “That’s right. He tried to teach me how to paint, once. Didn’t go very well and we used a different type of paint.”

Junior just nods, though he doesn’t understand this. Just like Peter nodded at Hughes that very morning.

They paint until long after Neal’s bed time and Mom rounds them up for goodnight kisses. Peter, when they’ve gone down the hall, takes the wrapping paper and carefully folds it. He puts it inside the shoe box hidden in his closet, along with the tag and the ribbon from last year. After one long, empty look at it, he tucks the box back where it belongs. 

Living, painting, eating, hugging—it’s the easiest thing in the world.

Dying is much harder.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Placing down the bottle of wine, a perfect match for the empty one they found in Kate’s apartment that day, Peter steps back and nods at it. There’s no card or note to go with it, for the bottle says everything he needs.
> 
> Everything he can’t.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to everyone for your kind notes and Happy Thanksgiving to any American readers!

‘Well I went walking in the woods Sunday,  
Stumbling upon a bird instead  
Singing songs sweet of hope.  
So I went back there the very next day  
But no melody rang home,  
No birds to sing…  
No bird.’

“Birds on Sunday” ~ Royal Wood

Resurrecting one’s inner eight year old is not difficult, but it often requires emotions that are hard to get back. Very specific headspaces are hard to access after four decades away from them.

Peter feels a bit foolish, truth be told, like he’s leaving out milk and cookies for Santa. He’s made sure to do it the night _before_ the three year anniversary, since he’s cottoned on that this has nothing to do with Neal Jr.’s birthday so much as it does passing those silent messages to Peter, as if they’re just kids in class hiding from the principal of the world’s eyes.

Junior was born four months after Neal ‘died,’ and that’s why, four months before his birthday, Peter finds himself alone on his front stoop, in the dark, watching a robin peck at his sidewalk garden.

He glances around but knows he won’t see anything. And sure enough, there is no one in sight except elderly Mrs. Carrol taking her plants indoors for the night.

Once she’s gone, Peter stands alone.

Alone, just Peter Burke like he was before Neal came into his life. Peter thinks about that one for a heady moment, a beat of breath into his lungs and a cosmos of lost entropy.

Placing down the bottle of wine, a perfect match for the empty one they found in Kate’s apartment that day, Peter steps back and nods at it. There’s no card or note to go with it, for the bottle says everything he needs.

Everything he can’t.

For those first few minutes after he wakes the next morning, Elle already up and in the shower, Peter pauses to consider when his ordinary life became so different. What he’d been like before he met Neal, everything in its perfect symmetry.

Then the lines got rewritten. They’re still there of course, but the lines are no longer grey and static. They morphed with every smile from Neal into beautiful, curved parabolas that soared higher than Peter dared look.

Now he does. Now his most fixated goal is finding out where those lines end and why they’ve become so hidden.

“Daddy!” Neal comes bounding into their bedroom, a big, red gift box in hand. “Daddy, look! A pwesent!”

Peter rubs his eyes, swinging his legs to the side. “It sure is, bud. Why don’t you open it and see what’s inside?”

Junior eagerly complies. Peter takes the chance to throw on his bathrobe, thankful it’s a Sunday and he has time to laze around before getting dressed. This gift box is store bought for once, covered in little doves and a huge white ribbon—linen, like the kind used for hotels.

There is no tag this time, just a card stock strip. This time, however, it’s hand written:

‘_You still have terrible taste in wine_.’

Peter reads it at least five times before Junior even gets the box lid open. He’s not sure whether to feel relieved that the bottle and its peace offering was taken, or sorrowful, or guilty about it all, the not-snooping and pushing at those supple lines.

A high pitched gasp from Neal startles Peter back to the present.

Seeing what’s in his son’s hands, only one single emotion blindsides Peter. He gasps too, a quieter sound, eyes a little too bright and affection pooling in the dry well of his heart.

Elle joins this pajama party, hair up in a towel, battling a few sniffles of her own. She address Junior but her eyes are all for Peter. “That’s so cool, sweetie! Do you want to get dressed and try it out?”

“Yeah!” Neal’s off like a shot. Elle follows on his heels, knowing she’ll have to help the almost-three year old with buttons on his pants. “C’mon, Mom!”

This affords Peter a very strategically executed opportunity to take the last few reverent steps toward the box…and pick up the child-sized baseball glove.

Nestled in its palm is a nearly-brand-new baseball straight from Yankee Stadium.

Peter looks up, out the window. He can’t see very well, and his breath feels like it’s been kangaroo kicked out of his sternum, but it’s enough to watch a mother chickadee feeding her babies a wriggly worm. She’s careful to make sure her hatchlings gobble it down well, that they’ve had their fill.

Peter swallows, eyes back down on the red stitches and white cow hide.

“He kept it,” Peter breathes. “He kept it all this time…”

It’s their baseball. The very one they threw back and forth on home plate. In terms of happy memories surrounding Neal, it’s one of the most carefree times Peter has ever seen him. Easy smiles, truly relaxed eyes, and that comfortable droop in the young man’s shoulders that spoke of feeling safe.

“Honey?” Elle pokes her head in. “That’s a nice gift you gave Neal, but are you okay to do this right now?”

A valid question, considering she knows how hard he’s taken the loss. She knows the grieving process doesn’t seem quite right for someone who ‘died,’ that it’s still sometimes too much to carry. That on bad days Peter’s not really here, in the moment, at all.

Peter straightens. “Of course. Let’s get some breakfast in him—and me—and we’re good to go.”

Elle soon has Neal bundled up in the backyard, complete with that tiny baseball glove. Peter retrieves his own from the shed, much more worn than the new one on Junior’s hand. It’s too big for the toddler but he’ll grow into it.

The thought, having years to play catch with his son, takes Peter completely off guard. He bends down to re-tie his sneakers, just for an excuse regain equilibrium by inhaling a few deep breaths.

“Daddy?”

“I’m ready!” Peter puts on a broad grin. “Are you, little man?”

“T’row it, Dad!”

Peter waves his glove to demonstrate. “Hold it in front of your chin and slightly out, like me. See?”

Neal copies his father’s motion and they’re in business. Peter under-hands the ball the first time. It’s a gentle toss but it still bonks Junior in the chest before he can grab it.

“Good first try!” Peter smiles, real this time. Neal’s a little young for this anyway, though it’s the bonding time that counts. “Toss it back!”

Neal does and Peter rushes forward to catch the ball before it can hit the ground. When he stands back up, Junior’s eyes have turned assessing, a perfect mirroring of the way Elle looks when she’s facing down a particularly challenging client request.

It makes Peter laugh before he can stop himself. “Getting the idea, buddy?”

Junior nods once, a short and doggone determined bob. Something shivers up Peter’s spine and into his suddenly dry mouth.

_You’d love Bubba Neal, Junior, for he already very much loves you. Just like I—_

“Daddy! I’m weady!”

Peter slaps his glove a few times with the ball, squatted low over his heels. He quirks his brow. “Here it comes.”

This throw has a bit more power behind it, an overhand motion. He expects it to whistle right past the little boy, who is still very much learning hand-eye coordination.

Suddenly Neal’s right hand stretches out and _snatches_ the ball out of the air.

It’s a perfect, fluid motion that drops Peter’s jaw. His eyes widen, breath escaping him in an incredulous huff.

Elle, sitting at the patio table, has spilled coffee down her fingers.

“Did you see that?” Peter exclaims. “He…he just…”

Elle laughs too. “I sure did! Good job, baby!”

Junior beams at the praise, chest puffing. To do so, he drops the ball, but Peter knows in that tell-it-over-family-reunions-for-the-next-twenty-years moment that he’s raising a miniature version of himself, an athletic child with a natural intuition for motor reflexes.

He’s just like Peter.

This isn’t the same as playing catch with Neal in Yankee Stadium, though he is also a somewhat athletic man. It isn’t similar enough for the obvious association to be painful.

Peter finds himself enjoying the moment.

His eyes, on the other hand, flit to the birds in the trees every few minutes.

He wonders what they think, what all those games of catch with Neal—both literal and metaphorical, the copious amounts of back and forth mistrust and humour and quick fire draws—resulted in, how lots of time spent with another human being is intimate, no matter how unemotional you want it to go.

Peter looks down at his glove.

It’s empty.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> And suddenly Peter realizes.
> 
> Suddenly, all at once like he should have from the very start, Peter _understands_.
> 
> He covers his eyes with a trembling hand, sobbing before he can stop himself. Undignified sounds like gunfire popping startle Peter at their force, with the ragged tail of breath he can’t seem to catch fast enough.

‘Just a flock of birds,  
That’s how you think of love.  
And I always look up to the sky,  
Pray before the dawn,  
Cause they fly away,  
Sometimes they arrive…  
Sometimes they’re gone.

So fly on, ride through,  
Maybe one day I’ll fly next to you.’

“Fly On” ~ Coldplay

Six whole months pass before Peter does some more reading—Elizabeth comes to hate those online bird watcher forums—and thinks to take his bag of seeds _home_.

“Unbelievable.” Elle stands at the back door of the kitchen. “I married the real life Mary Poppins.”

Peter looks up at her where he sits on the lawn chair, cheeky smile broad enough to show teeth. “That or the Jane Goodall of birds.”

Elle’s tone turns dry. “You keep telling yourself that.”

“Impressed yet?”

A chickadee darts closer to the dusting of seed at Peter’s feet. Mixed in with the village of robins are at least five pigeons, all cooing and pooping on his grass. It’s great. Elle watches a crow peck at the shiny knobs on their barbecue grill with a sigh.

“If you mean am I impressed that you haven’t gone completely Alfred Hitchcock on me, then yes. I am.”

“Maybe you’re just jealous.”

“Ha!” Elle’s bark of laughter startles a pigeon. “The day I’m jealous of your Snow White powers of bird whispering is the day I’m president.”

“Not too much of a wait, then.”

“You little snake charmer.” She leans down for a kiss. “Are you picking up Junior from day care this afternoon? I have a meeting until five.”

Peter nods. “You got it. I’m going in a few hours earlier so I can leave early. Love you.”

“Love you too…” Elle goes to leave but suddenly frowns at the birds. Peter opens his mouth to apologize for the quite frankly ridiculous amount of birds he’s managed to attract before he’s even had his morning coffee, but she speaks first. “Is that a piece of paper?”

Peter glances around, not seeing anything. The birds are all eating away, normal looking and cooing over top of each other.

Then he sees it too—a tiny white scroll attached to one of the pigeons’ back left leg.

Elle and Peter exchange a stunned look. Both their mouths hang open and Peter flails a hand. “That can’t seriously be a homing pigeon. On our _patio_. Do those even exist anymore?”

Elle shrugs, but she’s biting her lip. “Only one way to find out.”

“This isn’t World War two,” Peter argues, mostly to psyche himself up to catch the bird with his bare hands. “We have cellphones and texting and the Internet now.”

“I’m more concerned with when someone had time to train a bird to come to our house. Without us noticing!”

“I’ve learned that it’s better not to ask.”

No gallant feats of bird snatching are needed that day, as it turns out, because the bird is trained to flutter right to Peter once she sees hands reaching for her.

The bird lands in Peter’s open palms. He strokes her silky, pewter wings and her wheat coloured chest.

“There we go. What have we got here?” Peter gently tugs the scroll out of a plastic tube and pulls the string off.

Then he sets the bird on their deck table, letting her eat straight from the seed bag. She’s had a long journey, he suspects.

He unrolls the weathered paper, forced to read the whole paragraph three times before it sinks in. “It’s…it’s a tip.”

“A tip? Like about a crime?” Elle reads over his shoulder. “Honey, you have to call this in.”

Peter considers contesting that, since there’s no way someone would call in an art theft-slash-murder about to happen using a _homing pigeon._ It’s a tip about the Met, some famous painting Peter’s never heard of about to be stolen by shooting a backdoor guard and escaping through the employee kitchen, an unsophisticated crime using sophisticated technology.

But then Peter sees the security system information included, the fact that it’s a newer, state of the art technology designed _by _the FBI. Only a select handful of people even know it exists.

Only one non-agent was ever consulted for it.

Peter’s on the phone before the thought finishes coalescing. “Jones? Meet me at the Met, all hands on deck. Someone is about to rob it in an hour.”

They get there, organized, vested, and guns drawn, just as alarms go off.

Their two thieves try to make a run for it, just low levels on the hunt to make a bigger name for themselves, but Jones completes a truly spectacular tackle that takes both men down. The painting is safely retrieved from its mooring and the guard remains unharmed.

While CSU sweeps the building, the curator shakes Peter’s hand for a job well done. “I don’t know how you did it, Agent Burke. But thank you! You arrived here in perfect time!”

Peter shrugs, avoiding the man’s eyes. “Oh, just an anonymous tip. We get those sometimes.”

“On high profile thefts like this?” The curator’s brows shoot up. “Whistleblowing is rare in the elegant world of art crimes, I thought.”

There is a hushed silence. Then Peter nods. “It is, usually. Someone with a conscience didn’t want to see the guard shot.”

“How did you know about the security system override?”

“I designed it,” says Peter. “My team, I mean. We’ll prosecute your would-be thieves to the fullest extent of the law but do you mind if I take a walk around? Just to check the rest of the gallery?”

The curator holds out his arm. “Be my guest. You have a lifetime free pass, if you want it.”

“Thanks again.”

Peter bypasses the noisier sections of the gallery, where agents are wrapping up their witness statements and examination of the security system, to an empty wing. It’s not fully set up yet but Peter takes a moment to breathe in the paint, the smell of oil against hardwood floors.

The familiar scent of a home that doesn’t exist anymore.

He runs an unsteady hand down his face.

“Oh, Agent Burke?”

Peter composes himself in a quick, sloppy second. He turns to the see the curator running towards him, pointing to the corner of the room Peter is standing in.

“I just wanted to say that I think our thieves left some evidence over there.”

“Evidence?” Peter squints. “This wing isn’t even remotely near their target. The security system doesn’t show them coming through here at all.”

The curator shrugs. “Well, they dropped something.”

Peter follows the man towards a dim corner, not well lit as it’s still being set up. There are blank spaces on the wall for paintings to be hung soon. The curator comes to a stop in front of a large canvas.

This one Peter knows. “American Gothic?”

“On loan from Chicago,” the curator confirms. “See?”

And there, on the floor in front of the painting, is a tiny cloth sack, tied with a polka dot ribbon. Peter’s face softens, and he’s now immensely thankful for the poor lighting.

“That’s okay,” he says, quiet. “This isn’t evidence.”

The curator looks skeptical but simply nods. “I trust you to do what’s best.”

When the man is gone, Peter takes a moment to drink in the sight of the portrait—a farmer and his sister, the pitchfork, and the cloth sack covered in cows. He gingerly picks up the parcel, ‘_For Neal_,’ but understands that this present isn’t for Junior at all.

He unties it right then and there.

Inside are two plastic figurines to match the ones in Junior’s farmyard playset. A farmer in his straw hat and red shirt, and a woman in overalls. Her hair is tied back in two brown plaits.

It strikes Peter that maybe they’ve neglected little Neal’s development by not including human people in his playtime toys, a way to process the world around him.

Junior takes the new toys in stride when Peter presents them to him in the car, adding them to the plastic barn and miming them petting his favourite toy Holstein cow upon their arrival home. He’s rosy cheeked where he plays on the floor. His denim overalls match the woman, just like her hair matches Elle’s. Junior places her by the hay with a pitchfork, ‘feeding’ his plastic goats.

Elle comes home and smiles when she sees the new additions. “Did you get your bad guys? Was the tip real?”

“It sure was.” Peter takes her hand. “We stopped a murder, which isn’t an everyday thing for us. It felt good.”

“Gotta love Mozzie. From committing art crimes to ratting them out! Who knew?”

“Yeah…” Peter’s voice is absent, muted. “Good old Mozzie.”

He’s never told a soul about the shipping container and the faked death and paid off coroners. About the truth of it all, for Peter understands now that it was never the point.

_Surviving_ was never the point.

And isn’t Peter the real con man, for letting everyone believe it? He’s far better at this than Neal ever was.

Peter watches his son play for a long time, long enough that even after it gets dark and everyone else has gone to bed, he’s still thinking about those farmers, both painted and of the toy variety.

All at once, he remembers.

_I forgot about the bird!_

Peter darts outside, already devastated by the bizarre loss of a bizarre bird…only to see the pigeon still there, nested and sleeping on the patio table top.

Her eyes are closed, beak buried half in her wings, and it’s painfully endearing.

The night is balmier, warming up with the promise of summer a few months away, but someone has still placed a fluffy towel on the table for the pigeon to snuggle up in—Elle isn’t as irritated by the birds as she pretends.

Peter collapses into a chair. His pocket still holds the cloth sack and he takes it out, studying it in the moonlight. Crushing it with the urgent strength of his fingers.

He pictures the two farmers held inside this homemade wrapping and lovingly placed at the base of a famous painting.

And suddenly Peter realizes.

Suddenly, all at once like he should have from the very start, Peter _understands_.

He covers his eyes with a trembling hand, sobbing before he can stop himself. Undignified sounds like gunfire popping startle Peter at their force, with the ragged tail of breath he can’t seem to catch fast enough.

Big, plump droplets spill onto the glass table, only to leave little splatter patterns that join forces and multiply into Rorschach paintings of regret and transience.

A blizzard of motion, Peter digs in his pockets for a pen and scrap of paper. He finds one, a receipt for that little bistro they used to hit on stakeouts.

Once he’s ready to write, he freezes. A helpless, clinging glint shines in Peter’s eyes, for he has no idea how to encapsulate the depth of hurt, yearning, anger, and love swirling around unchecked inside his heart.

He sniffs to stop the flow from his eyes. It’s squeezed out of an achy spirit that’s tired, _so _tired, of not getting better.

It doesn’t work. He’s still weeping, in the throes of a crying fit greater even than that day at the hospital.

Nothing ever _works_: not his son, not his job, not the promise of a comfortable life ahead, not the knowledge that Neal is _fine_, doing what he does best…

None of this gets rid of the bereft wail inside Peter’s spirit. And now he realizes—admits—why.

What to write? How to say it all when words were never their best form of communication anyway?

In the end, he decides on five words. Only five, though there’s room for more.

Peter scratches them out with grit teeth.

He rolls up the receipt, slides it into the tube on the pigeon’s leg, and pets her one last time. Peter thinks she’ll stay the night and fly away in the morning, but when she senses the slight weight and string around her ankle, she fluffs her wings and gets ready to take off.

To Peter’s surprise, she lands first in his hands. Peter holds her close for a moment, feeling her heartbeat galloping away, not that far off from his own.

Then he stands, throws up his arms up, and she’s gone.

Her silhouette hovers for a moment against the moon, wings spread to fly away to worlds unknown. The pigeon takes Peter’s hope with her. Hollow boned, free to go where she pleases, yet drawn to the locations she’s memorized.

The only thing she knows.

Peter says his written words out loud, a benediction and a white flag all in one. “Your home is always waiting. _Always_.”

He inhales a staccato breath, wavering on his feet. “We’re always here. I never stopped waiting. You hear me? We…we never…I’m always here.”

Shipping containers are just bigger versions of a homing pigeon’s carrying tube, Peter understands now.

Messages flying on to the only two destinations they know. Carrying all of the things people need to be heard, with none of the real person there in the flesh to ease the ache of those messages.

Peter was euphoric when he opened that container over three years ago, found out Neal had planned the whole thing.

Now…now he wonders if euphoria and the brain surge of grief aren’t one and the same after all.

Neal Caffrey might have lived but Peter Burke died that day.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Is this the GSW patient, federal agent?”
> 
> “Yeah, three total.”
> 
> “Is he going to make it?”
> 
> Silence. Then a very fast beeping—_is that me?_ Peter hopes so because he’s not feeling very calm at the moment.
> 
> “…His chances aren’t good.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If anyone knows where to find the Brooke Palsson version of the song below, I would be indebted. It is literally impossible to track down but it's my favourite. Thanks to everyone for your lovely comments!

‘Should we be parted  
By winter winds blowing cold,  
I will give you my hand, love,  
Oh come now, take hold.

My heart has wings, love,  
Wings to carry me home,  
And my heart it sings, love:  
Your name is its song.’

“My Heart Has Wings” ~ Aengus Finnan

“He took two to the chest and one to his bicep.” There’s a hurricane of voices but one rises above the rest, both in volume and controlled urgency. “It was broad daylight! The man had a mask but he still took all three shots right there on the street!”

_Yeah and it hurt like hell,_ Peter clarifies. Or tries to.

Elizabeth’s voice is the clearest, where she runs alongside the gurney through…somewhere. It’s much too white wherever this is. Peter closes his eyes all the way to be rid of it.

But wait. Now he can’t see Elle.

Peter tries to open his eyes again, only this time it doesn’t work.

There’s the cool zip of something going at highway speeds through his veins. It keeps him from coughing around the mask over his mouth and kissing his wife and checking Neal’s mapping software—

That doesn’t feel right. Why doesn’t it feel right?

He’s always checking on Neal’s whereabouts: how much he’s plotting, what sort of party June is throwing this time, how many bucks Mozzie conned out of the Irish bartender _this _time, whether Neal is feeling happy or sad…

_Have I failed at my duties? But Neal’s never a duty, never an obligation. Does he know that?_

“BP is too low and I want a blood pack—make that two—ready to go in twenty minutes.”

“Yes, doctor. I have an IV started for a broad spectrum round of antibiotics.”

“Is he going to be okay?”

“Mrs. Burke—”

“I need to stay with him!”

Hands are torn off Peter’s shirt, the one they’re cutting away with cold scissor blades. He gurgles something in his throat and it doesn’t taste right either.

“Mrs. Burke, we’re taking him into OR. You can stay with the officers here but I’ll let you know as soon as he’s clear.”

“Doctor.” Elle sounds like she’s crying and boxing with someone simultaneously. “Take care of my husband. I can’t lose him too.”

“We have the best surgeons scrubbing as we speak. He’s in good hands.”

Peter isn’t so sure of that. The unfamiliar touch all over his body isn’t Elle, not one of Mozzie’s back slaps, not Junior’s tiny fingers clutching his thumb, not Neal’s fragile, glass arms reciprocating when Peter tugs him close for a tentative hug.

How can he be in the best hands if they’re not here?

A squeaky wheel, on the left side of Peter’s gurney, screams in place of the one he wants to let rip. It’s high pitched and grating and he feels gratified by it.

_I’m sorry, Elle_.

Peter falls asleep just as he’s wheeled through a set of doors into somewhere tiled and loud.

“Is this the GSW patient, federal agent?”

“Yeah, three total.”

“Is he going to make it?”

Silence. Then a very fast beeping—_is that me? _Peter hopes so because he’s not feeling very calm at the moment.

“…His chances aren’t good.”

* * *

Someone has hooked two very large, flaming crooks through his back and into his chest and shoulder, upon which are tied two millstones. Not just any millstones—big ones like at Stone Henge, all insistent and tearing at his flesh and too heavy to carry. There’s a smaller hook in his right arm, but this one is a paperweight. 

It’s exhausting. It is shocking in its persistence. It keeps him securely under in the depths of something too deep for sleep and too aware for a coma.

He hears words through the river’s passing over his head, up there in the world of sunlight and fresh air:

“High risk of infection…”

“Fevered.”

“Physical therapy.”

“Love you, baby.”

“Incredible blood loss…”

But very little of it makes any sense. There are times when Peter can let himself float if he relaxes just right, and then he’ll drift up, towards the current moving everyone else around him in a choreographed dance. He marvels that they all have the steps and here he is, clumsily tripping over both feet. Maybe he missed that memo.

Peter gets a little tired of being so alone, in the murky pockets of this river without a name.

There are sensations too, velvet against the skin of his fingers…but this doesn’t match the words even though Peter is _sure _they’re supposed to. Those tender words are soft spoken, just for his ears, and yet they filter in only long after the hand holding his own has gone. A time delay.

The first time Peter really opens his eyes, twenty four hours after emergency surgery, they only stay that way for two minutes. One hundred and twenty seconds.

Then he’s gone again, the crooks yanking him under.

He falls back asleep with a smile on his lips and the beautiful sight of his wife bending over him tucked close to his heart.

There are more times after that, short as they are. Peter feels like a photographer more than anything, capturing hazy images when he can steal them—moonlight on Junior’s sleeping profile at the foot of his bed, Elle kissing his cheek, the doctor tutting over him with her brows pulled tight, two nurses gossiping about a latest boyfriend while changing the sheets, a cop telling Elle in low tones that Peter’s attacker was found bludgeoned in an alley, the beeping of his low oxygen count…

Peter doesn’t remember what happened before he came to this tiny world of heavy sleep and red stained bandages.

He’s not sure he wants to.

Sometimes the doctor tries to speak to Peter when his eyes open for longer than five minutes, but her mouth is moving on mute, in contrast with the stereo sound of the rushing river around his ears.

After that, there’s a long period of simple sleep. _Real _sleep, so leaden that Peter doesn’t dream at all. He enjoys the blissful, nattering slumber of the drugged while the river rages on without him.

* * *

The next time Peter opens his eyes, something feels different.

It’s him, of course, more alert and fully in the present this time, though bone weary and sore down to his marrow. His consciousness is different, sharp to the point of wishing for the fuzziness back, and it’s daylight this time.

But that’s not it.

Peter realizes that he is alone. There’s usually someone hovering around but right now his stuffy room is vacant of all the usual visitors. So then why did he startle awake?

Something inside of him demanded he wake up, _right now_, but there’s no one here.

He looks around—

A hat sits on his bedside table.

It is not the elfin, tiny hat that Junior loves to wear, though this one is also a black trilby. It boasts no accoutrements or shiny brocade. Elegant, classic, and a little weather worn around the brim, the hat’s owner is nowhere to be found and yet it still commands all the attention.

Gazing at it, Peter feels warmth seep all the way down to his toes in a delicious, golden splash. He smiles through the sudden burn of tears.

There is no way to mark the passing of time, but Peter looks down to see far, far fewer wires and tubes and machines hooked into his body than last time. Just an IV and a pulse ox. An oxygen tank sits by the door, just in case.

Thankfully, his chart is on the other bedside table, not the footboard. Peter reads it over best he can without his glasses, realizing by the notes that he’s been in here for over a week. One bullet to the left shoulder, through and through, easily recovered from. Second to the right bicep—chipped the bone but no nerve damage.

Third…

The third round grazed his stomach and the top of his large intestine.

Peter has to put the chart down, closing his eyes but _painfully_ awake. The reality of it all sinks in—vacation in Washington to visit Elle’s friends…hearing the alarms from a bank across the street…running to intercept the getaway vehicle…turning around to see the gun in his face…Elle’s screams…

Peter reads the whole thing through again, the blood transfusion and details of the surgery to fish out the third bullet in his abdomen.

_I shouldn’t be alive._ Doctors are good, but he was a fifty-fifty chance of survival, best case scenario. Worst case…worst case Peter knows a lot of people better off than him have died on the table.

_Second chances seem to be going around._

The moment this thought hits Peter in full—he’s off.

It’s inadvisable, and he’d be shouting at anyone else who tried such a stunt, but none of this stops him from swinging his legs to the side and taking off the pulse ox. He slides on his bathrobe, his favourite one left there by Elle.

A wheelchair sits in the corner, only two steps to get to.

It feels a desert away, with all the pain throbbing through Peter’s torso.

He clenches his teeth and waits it out. After an agonizing few minutes, the episode passes, fading to a dull pulsing at the entry sites. Huge wads of bandages make his scrubs bulky around his belly button, shoulder, and arm.

Peter falls into the wheelchair and gets himself sorted after a few minutes of figuring out how to pull the IV beside him. He links his elbow around it, so that he hugs it close while inching along.

There’s a small bag on the table, containing a few chocolate croissants Elle must have left last time she was here, and Peter puts it in his pocket.

Luckily, his room is on the ground floor, right next to a small door leading out to the massive garden he can see through his window. Summer began early this year, lending everything a bright sheen and the wind a balmy quality.

Peter wastes no time in sneaking down the hall, rolling the chair with his feet since both arms are out of commission. Nurses bustle through the wing but none notice Peter turn the corner for a more secluded hallway, leading outside.

He presses the wheelchair button on the door and it swings open. Finally—his head break’s the river’s surface with the explosion of fresh, outdoor air.

The May wind is crisp, yet soaked through with the intoxicating smell of cherry blossoms, from trees that line the path leading to one lonely park bench. It overlooks the Potomac and a whole _field_ of wild flowers.

Peter is in awe of the pink and red petals that flutter up from the intrusion of the wheels, flying in a torrent about his eyes.

He’s sure they’re in his hair too, about his ears, in the aged folds of his skin, where he feels he’s lived a century since that day in the morgue. It hasn’t even been four years, but there’s something elderly about the way it sags upon Peter’s shoulders.

At last, he grinds to a stop.

The view is spectacular, nary a cloud in sight over the park. Someone has already taken the corner seat on the right side of the bench. But that’s okay, especially since his elbow brushes Peter’s where they both sit on the arm rest.

For a long few minutes, they don’t look at each other.

Peter’s eyes, for his part, are fixed on an osprey far up in the sky, circling the water while hunting for lunch. That, and the sway of the wildflowers as each gentle breeze combs through them. 

There’s a shift of fabric, the wool of a tailored sweater, against Peter’s wrist.

Then a sigh.

Peter has a fountain of words upon his lips, but when he glances at Neal, the dishevelled auburn locks, weight he’s lost in bony shadows around his ribs and jaw, the way the collared shirt and sweater hang off his shoulders at a crooked angle like a child playing dress up…

Only one course of action remains. It has been there all along, from day one, and he finally stops denying it.

Peter takes Neal’s hand.

It’s soft and cool, smaller than Peter’s. The fingers are slender and graceful compared to Peter’s burly ones and Peter holds them with more care than his mother’s crystal.

He dares to squeeze them a touch.

Neal doesn’t react, other than to blink a little faster. His eyes still stare straight ahead at absolutely nothing.

“I heard my shooter was beaten—with prejudice—in an alley…something about a tire iron to his face?”

Neal’s lips quirk. He keeps his voice to Peter’s low, quiet tone. “Effective.”

“Mmm.” Peter can’t fight a shrewd, tired grin. “You wouldn’t happen to know anything about that?”

“Me? An upstanding citizen? Handcuffing a perp and calling it in is more your style.”

“Who said anything about handcuffs?”

Neal’s brow beetles. “Police scanner?”

“Nice try.”

Something icy and fiery all at once sparks in Neal’s eyes. “If I let someone go around shooting good people, what does that make me?”

Peter’s chest cinches with a swelling ache. He opens his mouth to thank Neal for all the gifts, for staying in touch, however odd the method, to say that he gets what it all meant now…but it dies on his tongue.

He must clench his hand a little too hard, because Neal’s head swivels to finally, _finally_ lock eyes with him.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “I gave you what you wanted.” Neal’s voice is slightly higher pitched than can be passed off as neutral. He’s oozing with an earnest sound, the anguish of his bleeding hope that’s been slayed so many times. Over and over again. “Don’t you get it? I gave you what you couldn’t ask for! You didn’t have to be burdened with me anymore…”
> 
> Peter’s heart shatters.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter ended up being too long so I promptly divided it into two. Thanks to everyone for reading!

‘Feed the birds down in Brooklyn town,  
Little kid gonna wear the crown.  
First you gotta find your way out,  
Spend some time in detention hall.

Yeah, that kid, he’s so dynamite  
Give a taste and he’ll take a bite—  
Spending all that you had to give  
What a life that you’ve had to live.’

“Feed the Birds” ~ Kids of 88

It’s their first eye contact in four years, since that hellish day by the ambulance. It knocks the wind out of Peter at once, with such abandon that he wonders distantly if his stitches have reopened.

“You’ve been here in the States,” he whispers, “All this time.”

Neal shakes his head. “Not at first. Tried to make a life for myself, to pick back up where I left off.”

He looks away suddenly, going stiff. Peter’s wounds throb harder.

“We conned ourselves.” Peter breathes out, in a rush, and it hurts as much as getting shot. “We thought we fooled the world but we didn’t, Neal. We hoodwinked ourselves instead.”

Neal’s nostrils flare with some sort of held back sound, matching the firm, white line of his lips. He starts to shake his head, but Peter talks right over him.

“We did.” Peter laughs and the sound isn’t a laugh at all. “We put up walls, played a pretend version of ourselves to protect those vulnerable spots for so long that we bought into the illusion. We fooled ourselves into thinking they were _real_.”

It’s a messy rush of a confession, stirred there upon Peter’s tongue for almost a year, when the truth of it all hit him, how much Neal loved them and thought he wasn’t allowed to. They’ve skipped small talk and gone straight to the vomit of those emotions, ones which will not be silenced a second longer.

Peter tries to calm his patchy breathes when a lancing pain starts up along his abdomen.

“I’ve been pretending for a long time,” Neal murmurs.

Though it should sound simple, an obvious statement, there’s something horrifically old and wise and condemned in the way he says it. Something that doesn’t sound like Neal at all, or at least not the one he lets others see.

Neal’s mouth does a funny mishmash and then smooths. “Being chased…being chased is a lot like being wanted.”

Confessions _also_ seem to be making the rounds today. Peter feels like an idiot.

He stands from the chair and drags both the IV and himself over to the bench. Neal is still lost somewhere in the fatigue and despair of this whole charade, so Peter shoves him down and usurps his spot.

This allows Peter to shift forward and look this young, elderly man in the eye.

“Neal…” And Peter has to stop, swallowing a few times. The reality and privilege of it, sitting next to a supposedly dead friend, wallops him suddenly. “Neal, I never stopped caring about you.”

Neal tries to pull away but Peter stoops to keep his gaze. “No, look at me. Please. It’s my fault—I should have discussed your future with you long before the Pink Panthers, that I was going to offer you a job once you got released. Either with the Bureau or at Elle’s gallery, as a security consultant.”

A strange stillness settles over Neal. His eyes widen. “You…you were? I thought you’d want to be rid of me the first chance you got.”

Peter’s hands aren’t steady and he presses them together. The childlike tone nearly bowls him clean off his seat, drowning him back under that river with its sunlight just out of reach.

“I gave you what you wanted.” Neal’s voice is slightly higher pitched than can be passed off as neutral. He’s oozing with an earnest sound, the anguish of his bleeding hope that’s been slayed so many times. Over and over again. “Don’t you get it? I gave you what you couldn’t ask for! You didn’t have to be burdened with me anymore…”

Peter’s heart shatters.

He has only seen Neal truly cry _maybe_ three times in working together. And this isn’t even really weeping, just Neal exhaling and inhaling in fire cracker snaps, shallow and uneven and a set of brass knuckles straight to Peter’s heart.

Neal hangs his head and Peter’s moving before he can think himself out of it.

No more thinking. No more pride. No more censoring that love in a futile effort to save his career or his reputation, or to remain isolated in the white tower of his cushy life.

Peter has Neal wrapped up in his arms before the next cherry blossom falls.

His lips are already shaking and it feels right, the wiry weight of Neal against his shoulder, face buried in the unbandaged section of Peter’s sternum.

“I’m sorry,” he whispers to the curly head, repeating it until it’s just one giant word of sorrow and regret. “I’m _so _sorry, Neal. I’m sorry I pushed you away. I’m sorry I put work before you and that, if we’re honest, I was excited by the birth of Junior so that he could replace you.”

Neal’s breath snags completely this time.

Peter rests his cheek on Neal’s crown. Unruly strands tickle his nose. “Now I get it. Junior can’t and he never will.”

Neal pulls back just enough to check Peter’s face, trying to read it. Searching for what, Peter has a pretty good idea of, as someone who both lies and gets lied to for a living.

“Did you mean it?” he asks suddenly. His eyes are a storm, serious and insecure and so ironclad that Peter _aches_ to smooth its cause away. “What you wrote to me? I thought…I thought maybe you’d just said it, that you were playing with me.”

Peter starts shaking for an entirely new reason. He rumbles out a furious sound. “I meant every word. We love you Neal: and we never stopped.”

He thinks of the gifts and fights another wave of tears. They were all love notes, admissions of what the Burke family, and Hughes, Peter supposes in this long line of older mentor figures, mean to Neal. How he truly sees them. 

“I didn’t like the truth of it at first—but you changed me, Neal. I can’t just magically go back to the way I was before I met you.”

Neal attempts to discreetly wipe his eyes and fails. “I’m so…done.”

“Stealing?”

“That’s still fun, sometimes. Can’t get rid of two decades of old habits.”

Peter ruffles Neal’s hair for the joy of feeling a youthful hand bat him away.

Then Neal sighs, this one ragged. “But I just want to go home.”

Peter’s breath stops altogether.

Home: a house, a favourite couch, the irritating sounds of Mozzie’s off key singing, birds, bad coffee, boring loafers. A state of being, of pure peace, that Peter misses like an amputated limb.

Would any of it have mattered to the same hallowed degree if he hadn’t met Neal? Would he have taken his wife and his bad coffee for granted?

Neal didn’t rearrange Peter’s life per say, not intrinsically. But he is Peter’s prescription lenses, making him see the world the way it was intended. The sheer _value_ of everything he’s been given.

The world hasn’t changed—_Peter _has.

Peter wonders about plastic farmers and wine corks and hats and playing cards, if they aren’t all made of the same cosmic dust, destined to find each other. If they aren’t the exact same things, in the end. A house, this family, a child who was meant to be found.

“I think I can help with that. But first.” Peter pulls out the bag. “Croissant?”

He gets the enormous pleasure of seeing Neal’s mouth drop into an ‘o’ of surprise and confusion. Peter keeps his expression light, despite how emotional they both look, to hide his worry. He’s still not adjusted to seeing the sharp lines of Neal’s collarbone and twig thin wrists.

Hollow bones, played by the wind.

Neal sniffs at the bag and takes one. Peter keeps his arm around Neal’s shoulders, both men leaned back and worn thin.

Watching Neal bite into the pastry and make an impressed noise in his throat immediately snips the millstones weighing on Peter. He nearly wails with relief. It’s one of the most gorgeous things he’s ever seen.

“Elle has good taste,” says Neal with his mouth full, usual grace vanished. “I’m assuming she bought these because you think truck stop food tastes good.”

Peter smiles and sheds a tear that is, for the first time in almost four years, borne of happiness and not grief. He takes his first real breath in almost half a decade.

He makes Neal eat another one, then a third. There’s chocolate in the dimple of Neal’s lips and Peter doesn’t lift a finger to get rid of it.

He wishes, not for the first time, that he had Neal’s painting skills so that he memorialize the sight forever. Peter settles for studying the scene—cherry petal caught in Neal’s curls, mouth framed by chocolate, collar askew, sun winking off the turquoise of his eyes. Perfectly imperfect.

“Peter?”

“Mmm?”

Neal looks uncharacteristically anxious, coming apart at the edges. “I don’t think I can do it. I don’t know if I’m capable of settling down in one place forever.”

“I know,” Peter whispers.

“You’re not going to take me in?” Neal’s eyes whip to him. “Isn’t that what you want?”

Peter’s eyes burn with a vengeance. He cinches his arm so Neal is pulled tighter to his side. “Maybe. Maybe I’d kill to have you back in my life, but I can’t make you do anything, Neal. Nor should I. What I want more than anything in the world is for you to be happy, to be loved.”

It’s Neal who has to swallow this time.

“I respect you too much to control you,” says Peter, lightheaded at finally airing the words he should have from the very beginning. “You’re your own man.”

Neal’s lips are losing the battle, twisted into angry, defeated shapes. A crestfallen frown overtakes them.

Peter leans in close to whisper. “You’re your own man—and you’re mine. No matter where you go, I’m always here, waiting for you.”

The wind has finally calmed, flowers still, petals falling straight down instead of in giddy swirls. It’s enough to feel both their pulse points where Peter’s hand has come to rest over Neal’s heart. One fast with injury, one fast with emotion, a hope Peter knows Neal didn’t allow himself to entertain for years.

“I thought you didn’t want me anymore. I’m disposable.”

“Not on your life,” Peter growls. “We were both just too stubborn to admit that to each other.”

There’s none of that now, none of the buffed up pride and self sufficiency poisoning their relationship back then.

Now, Peter is just plain old _tired_, ready and waiting with empty hands for the messy splendour of Neal’s life to come fill them.

Knowing that it has to be his choice.

“I’m sorry I lied to you.” Neal genuinely looks it, teeth grit with self-recrimination.

Peter nods, then shakes his head. “I get why you did. I put my job first back then but no more, you hear? If the Bureau asks me to choose between them or you, I’ll choose you every time.”

Neal about crumples then, eyes blown huge by the wonder of it all.

A new voice joins them—“Ditto, Sinatra.”

The men turn to see Elizabeth approaching with one hand on her hip, the other holding a take out bag.

She doesn’t look like she’s about to faint or gobsmacked or anything. In fact, she even winks at Neal when he startles forward, ready to bolt.

Peter flounders. “Honey, I can explain, I mean…I didn’t…we just thought…”

“Oh please.” Elle gently swats Peter upside the head, ending in an affectionate stroke. “Although I was never sure, I’ve suspected for years that Neal might be alive. Hello, sweetie.”

The term of endearment is light, a throw away, but Neal still melts. He hops to his feet to fall into Elle’s open arms. At last, Peter’s world slots in to place.

“How are you, Elle?”

“Better now that you’re here.” She hugs him tighter, chuckling through her tears. “I’ve missed you!”

Elle must feel how underweight Neal is too, her eyes brimming with worry upon meeting Peter’s over his shoulder. How the youth’s boniness juts out into unnatural points.

When they step back, Elle grasps Neal by both shoulders, one brow arched. She glances at Peter’s bullet wounds. “Thank you for catching his shooter.”

“Of course,” says Neal, solemn.

“Now.” Elle composes herself with a sniff. She holds out the bag, voice in business mode. “This is a two course meal of linguini, garlic loaves, and tiramisu—and you are going to eat all of it, Mr. Caffrey. If I see so much as one bite left, I will steal your favourite hat.”

Peter laughs to see Neal lost for words a second time in one hour. It’s delectable, the pure bliss of a world he never thought he’d get to see again.

But it’s there—that love for Neal and their perfectly matched puzzle pieces. They’ve been filed down, chipped, yet they still fit together better than Peter ever realized.

“I hear you’ve become an old man for real.” Neal says this some time later, around a huge bite of bread. “Feeding birds in Central Park. That’s retro, Peter.”

Peter feels a dizzying sense of smugness, watching the meal steadily dwindle. Elle stands off to one side, on the phone and chatting with her friend to convince her not to visit Peter in the hospital today.

Neal’s current state is still a secret, after all. At least for now.

“I might just give it up,” says Peter. He steals a forkful of dessert that definitely does not sit well after a week of a liquid diet. “I’ve got a better hobby now.”

“Bird _watching_?”

Neal digs into the sugary treat and Peter’s gut fizzes with a soaked, tender affection. “Something like that…”

“Give me some time,” Neal asks, once he’s slumped in a food coma, gazing at Peter with those lost, bright eyes. “I can’t promise I’ll be back, be able to stay and get a real job, but I’m glad you’re okay. Just give me some time.”

Peter looks at the face of this young man, the one he hated at the opening of the curtain. The one he’s come to long for like the beating of his heart. He cups it, for one breathless moment.

“As much as you need. We’re always here.”

And for the first time, Neal nods back with unshakable trust. “I know.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You got me. Chocolate filled croissants are my weakness. The thought of Neal digging into one and getting messy was too lovely of an image not to put here. 
> 
> I cried a lil bit writing this scene! There’s nothing more gorgeous than barriers, especially ones the main characters built themselves, falling down.


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Clinton,” Peter says suddenly, “you come from good people.”
> 
> Jones’ eyes soften at once, crackling with warmth. “You bet. My folks and I didn’t always see things the same way growing up, but they are the best parents a guy could ask for.”
> 
> Peter tries to keep his tone light, but it comes out with a serious edge. “How do you know they love you?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Season's Greetings, lovely people! Hope you enjoyed the ride.

‘Come feed the little birds, show them you care,  
And you’ll be glad if you do—  
Their young ones are hungry,  
Their nests are so bare.’

“Feed the Birds” ~ Mary Poppins

Even with the growing dark of Manhattan’s skyline, it feels just as bright as daytime, thanks to Christmas trees and lights flashing in every floor and even a little electric menorah in the window of the building across from Peter’s office. Festive might not be strong enough a word for the spirit of the city, especially with the first snowfall of the season _finally_ starting right now. Just in the nick of time.

A hesitant knock taps on Peter’s office door, tearing him from his thoughts.

He swivels in his chair and smiles. “Jones! We’re officially off shift. What are you still doing here?”

“All due respect, Peter—I was about to ask you the same thing.”

Peter shrugs, waving a hand at the window. “Just…enjoying the view.”

“Is this the new Burke hobby?” Jones casts him a knowing look, stepping inside. A red scarf is draped around his neck. “We need fodder for the coffee pot gossip since you gave up bird watching.”

“Me getting shot three times while on vacation wasn’t enough for you all?”

“That was eight months ago. Keep up, Peter.”

With an amiable chuckle, Peter shakes his head. “It’s snowing at last. I guess I wanted to watch the show for a while.”

It’s a non answer, not really the truth, but Clinton doesn’t call him out on it. Instead, hands in his pocket, he rocks on his heels.

His eyes, like Peter’s, stray to an empty picture frame on the man’s desk. Peter has lots of photos up around his office now, ones of Elle being the oldest. But now there are new ones—Junior in his little hat, the boy’s paint stained fingers, both of them asleep on the couch, a family portrait from last Halloween where they all dressed up as the Addam’s Family.

However, there is a small one, simple and bordered only by a silver frame, that sits closest to Peter’s computer monitor.

There’s nothing in it.

People have asked, of course, and it’s a topic of great debate in the office over why Peter guards it so carefully if it’s empty. There’s even a betting pool going on what he’ll eventually put inside it. Not an expensive frame, the plain holder is propped up by one of those cardboard arms.

“Ah. A step of faith,” Elle had called the frame when she first noticed it. She’d understood at once and Peter loved her a little more for it.

For Peter, the empty frame feels like looking at an ultrasound photo, the promise of something to come that hasn’t happened yet. A picture that he hopes to take tomorrow.

“Clinton,” Peter says suddenly, “you come from good people.”

Jones’ eyes soften at once, crackling with warmth. “You bet. My folks and I didn’t always see things the same way growing up, but they are the best parents a guy could ask for.”

Peter tries to keep his tone light, but it comes out with a serious edge. “How do you know they love you?”

Clinton looks lost for a beat. His eyes cloud over with thought and memories relived.

“They love you, right?” Peter opens his hands. “How do they show you, feed you, that kind of affection?”

Jones’ face clears in understanding. “I suppose it depends on a person’s love language. Some people like gifts or hugs. Take Caffrey for instance—”

Peter’s heart skitters into his throat but Clinton’s smile is nostalgic, and he doesn’t seem to be talking present tense.

“—That dude liked gifts, sure. But he showed up on my doorstep one night, all those years ago, just to talk.”

Peter feels like he’s taken a baseball bat to the face. His stomach, like it’s wont to do sometimes now, throbs with a dull ache. “He did? _Neal_?”

“Yeah! He was the best listener I’ve ever met, Peter. He wanted to hear all about my life and my family and it hit me that what Neal always longed for but never got was just…quality time. That’s it. Gifts were like…a plea, I guess? Asking for something he never received. Trying to buy the kind of love he was too vulnerable to seek after.”

Sitting back, Peter runs an unsteady hand down his mouth.

Jones shakes himself back to the office and present day. His eyes, sad for a moment with the mention of Neal, brighten. “So, to answer your question—the best expression of love you can possibly give someone is knowing that person well enough to speak their language. I hope that makes sense.”

“Don’t worry, Clinton.” Peter nods at him. “You’ve been more than helpful.”

_More than you’ll ever know._

For a beat, they just watch spongy flakes descend upon the city. It mutes the honking of taxi cars and tire screeches far below.

“You’re a great father, Peter.” There’s a knowing catch to Jones’ upturned lips. It contrasts starkly against his weighted gaze. “So long as you’re determined in your heart to keep loving your son, to make that conscious choice every day, he’ll know you do.”

Peter’s voice comes out a breath. “I hope so. I’ve made too many mistakes over the years, so many…”

Jones’ eyes soften again, this time in sympathy and fondness. “I’m no parent, not yet anyway, but it’s scary. To love someone that much—it’s what my dad always said, that to let someone into your heart is the hardest, most rewarding thing a person can do.”

“Even when that person doesn’t want it?” Peter’s voice is small, desperate.

Jones is nodding before Peter even finishes. He gestures with an adamant hand. “Who wouldn’t want your love, Peter? People throw up their guard, sure, but they’ll come back when they need you. Love is like a stain, a paint, you can never fully get rid of—he’ll remember it.”

A sudden burn fights along the back of Peter’s eyes. There’s been no word, no more gifts, no homing pigeons even, since that day in DC. He’s even pried Mozzie for details and come up empty.

But no matter what happens, Peter knows he will love that boy until his dying breath.

Jones’ eyes narrow in playful humour. “You ever gonna tell us what the infamous picture frame is for?”

“Nope. Happy Kwanzaa, Clinton.”

Jones laughs, waving while heading out. “Merry Christmas, Peter.”

* * *

“Ah! Ah!” With a mad dash, Peter gets to Junior in time to pull his hands away from a china ornament on the tree. Neal blinks at him in surprise. “That one is Grammy’s, remember?”

Junior thinks about this. “No touch?”

“That’s right, buddy. No touch. You can play with this one, though—it’s just a stuffed snowman.”

Neal brightens, taking to this idea like a house on fire. Peter sags at yet another crisis averted. Elle hasn’t even noticed the near-catastrophe, hands wringing.

“Do you think he’ll come?” she asks Peter, for the umpteenth time. “We used that stupid homing pigeon and everything to send the invite.”

Peter doesn’t feel so fretting anymore, at ease and content with whatever happens tonight. “We told him we’ll wait to open presents until he arrives, if he arrives. He knows the drill.”

“I want him to understand that he’s family.” Elle isn’t on the verge of tears anymore, like she’d been all summer with the confirmation of the fact Neal isn’t dead. Instead, she has that battle face, determined and fired up. “That we miss him. That I’d give him a job in a heartbeat if he asked for it.”

Peter tucks her under his arm. “I think he does, honey. He said to give him time and I’ll honour that. If we don’t get to see him again for another ten years, I’m patient enough to wait.”

“That you are, Agent Burke.” Elle tugs his sleeve. “Even in that super ugly Christmas sweater.”

Peter rolls his eyes. “Okay. Here we go.”

“It’s a thrift find, Peter! Nobody deliberately goes out to find an ugly sweater!”

“Well, I did.” Peter holds out his arms. “I think the snowflakes on it are neat.”

Elle tries to look stern, then gives up. She snickers. “Someone threw it away, Peter. I don’t know how to break it to you, but you might as well have said you dumpster dived for it.”

“One man’s trash…”

“You’re hopeless.” Elle flaps her hand, still giggling.

“Oh yeah?” Peter wiggles his brows. “Think you can teach an old dog some new tricks?”

This sets Elle off even more. “Not in that sweater, I can’t.”

They’re still in stitches while eating supper, saying nothing more of the extra plate they’ve set out that remains untouched. Or how the clock ticks past eight and into Junior’s bed time. They let him open one gift—a fireman dress up kit—and then promise he can do the rest tomorrow morning.

Or how the snow has started outside and they can hear a crow cawing.

Elle downs a glass of wine rapid fire, her palms sweaty, while the couple sits on the couch, hushed. As if they’re just children waiting for reindeer hooves or carolers or some other sound that is not their disappointed expectations.

Peter looks out the kitchen window, to the suet-wreath he hung on it. A bright red cardinal comes and visits the offering, pecking at dark seeds, its red chest matching the ribbon tied around the wreath.

Even it has a home, and Peter can only hope that’s true of everyone this cold night. He hesitates, then glances at the little pile of presents under the tree that they’d made or bought. Peter thinks about how many years it will take until their owner can open and enjoy them.

The truth sags around them…

_He’s not coming. _

Around midnight, they call it quits. Sighing, they clean up without a word and get ready for bed. Peter’s foot has just hit the bottom step—

When there’s a knock on the door.

Elle rushes past him to fling it open, gasping and flushed.

And there is Neal, juggling boxes of gifts for all of them, tie coming undone, snow settling in his hair and melting just slow enough that streetlights amplify the halo in diplopic flashes.

He stands there with a brilliant smile, teeth and all, a fleshed out frame, and a future full of possibilities.

“Sorry I’m late.” He laughs, the sound of shackles coming off. “Flying coach on Christmas Eve _sucks_.”

**Author's Note:**

> Written November - December 2019.


End file.
